Phil Manzanera is, in his own words, “knackered.” Maybe it’s his age, or the fact that Roxy Music are getting back together for their first UK tour for 10 years to mark the band’s 40th anniversary.

Yes, unbelievably, it’s nearly four full decades since the likes of Virginia Plain, Do The Strand, Remake Remodel and Ladytron burst into the national consciousness. Love or loathe them (and there were a few in the latter category) Roxy were certainly different.

“It’s incredible,” says Phil, rock’s pre-eminent Anglo-Colombian guitarist. “Where has the time gone? I do not feel as if I am coming up to 60 or that Roxy are coming up to 40.

“I got involved in music when I was 20. You thought you would be doing it for a year and then you would buckle down and get a proper job. You are just so lucky.

“I was brought up in South America, Cuba, Venezuela, and it seems I was born to be on the road. It is fantastic, we are so lucky that people still want to come and see us.”

On Monday Roxy will roll into town for their first concert at the LG Arena in a decade. So why the long wait, given that they can still pull in the crowds, 40 years after some people (notably “Whispering” Bob Harris on the Old Grey Whistle Test) dismissed them as cold-eyed posers?

“If you look at the statistics, this is only the second time we have played (on tour) in the UK in the last 30 years. Before 2001, we had not played together for 18 years.

“Roxy was never really a band, it was more of a collective of people who had all sorts of different interests. Right from the beginning, we were all doing hundreds of different things.

“Today it’s the same dynamic, it’s music which brought us together. You can look on us as a collective and we had certain interests in common.

“Bryan loved soul, Elvis, jazz. Andy was into classical music, the avant garde. It’s like making a painting, you have all these different colours, each person can create.

“It’s incredible that all of us 40 years later are still so active. We love music. We have been rehearsing trying to get as many new songs from the albums into the live set.”

But, Phil, there aren’t any new songs.

The last Roxy album, the oh-so smooth Avalon, hit the record shops back in 1982, the year of the Falklands War and QPR’s only FA Cup final appearance.

Mr Manzanera chuckles. “We did do some new stuff in the studio five years ago. It is just sitting there on my laptop.

“We are an incredibly dysfunctional band, we just follow our noses. We have not had a manager for 30 years and we just bumble along. It’s quite nice, it’s not big business.”

So will all those Roxy fans who lapped up left field stuff like The Bob Medley and Sea Breezes back in 1972 ever get to hear any new material? Let alone a new generation of fans more familiar with Love is the Drug and Dance Away?

“If we can get the momentum going... but you need a lot of energy to finish the stuff.”

Phil is currently expending all his energies on the forthcoming UK tour, which promises to roll back the years as much for the band as for the audience.

“It’s incredibly tiring, we’re trying out something like 30 songs. We are rehearsing for up to eight or nine hours. I’m knackered.

“You think that maybe it is the last time we will do this. If I was in my 40s, I might not be thinking that. But it’s about ‘let’s go out and show the audience we can rock’.

“I still get a little bit nervous. I want to go out and do a great job.”

For Roxy aficionados of long-time standing, Phil is also releasing as collector’s editions two 70s albums, Mainstream by Quiet Sun, his original four-piece band, and Diamond Head, his first solo album, which featured the likes of Brian Eno, Robert Wyatt, Andy Mackay, John Wetton and Paul Thompson.

But ask him what his favourite Roxy album is and you’re transported all the way back to 1973, and For Your Pleasure, with Bryan Ferry kitted out for the LP cover as a chauffeur to model Amanda Lear.

“I think the first two albums still sound fresh, I’m very proud of that. Music is a wonderful therapy for people, and it’s great being part of a band and making records. It really helps people in their lives.”

The LG Arena concert next week coincides with a rather special milestone for the affable Mr Manzanera – his 60th birthday.

“I’m going to have a party after the show. I would not want anything more than to be on stage for my 60th.” It promises to be quite a celebration.

* Roxy Music play the LG Arena, Birmingham, on Monday, January 31. www.ticketfactory.com